“Translation and Globalization"
Spring 2007
T 12:30-3 pm E250 AJB
| Natasa Durovicova | Office Hours: M 1-3 100 SHSE |
| Russell Valentino | Office Hours: Th 3-5 W225 AJB |
The discourse of globalization is dominated by a rhetoric of immediacy and transparency. Time and space appear to compress as information “flows,” passing with apparent ease and exactness from language to language, culture to culture, and medium to medium, often all three at once.
This course aims to study the complexity of the infrastructures that allow and prevent global translation to occur, whether at the level of the intrinsic linguistic difficulties of languages and texts, the long and arduous formation of translators, the state of publishing entities, the asymmetrical distribution of media structures, or the proliferation of techniques and technologies associated with these processes.
Required Readings
- Altman, Rick, “Moving Lips: Cinema as Ventriloquism” in Yale French Studies 60
- Bassnett, Susan and Andre Lefevere. “The Cultural Turn in Translation Studies,” in Translation, History, and Culture (London and NY: Printer Pub, 1990).
- Béhar, Henri, “Cultural Ventriloquism,” in I. Balfour and A. Egoyan, eds. Subtitles: On
the Foreignness of Film (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2004) - Berman, Antoine. “Herder: Fidelity and Expansion,” “Bildung and the Demand of Translation,” Goethe: Translation and World Literature,” and “Conclusion” from The Experience of the Foreign: Culture and Translation in Romantic Germany (Albany: SUNY Press, 1992), pp. 35-64 and 175-191.
- Betz, Mark, “The Name above the (Sub)Title: Internationalism, Coproduction, and
Polyglot European Cinema,” Camera Obscura 16: 1-45 (2001). - Bhabha, Homi K. “How Newness Enters the World,” in The Location of Culture (London: Routledge, 1998).
- Cattrysse, Patrick, “Multimeda and Translation: Methodological Considerations’ in
(Multi)Media Translation (Amsterdam: Benjamins, 2001). - Cazdyn, Eric, “A New Line in the Geometry” in Balfour and Egoya, eds. Subtitles
- Cronin, Michael. “Thou Shalt Be One With the Birds” (file available at www.multilingual-matters.net/laic/002/0086/laic0020086.pdf).
- Cronin, Michael. Translation and Globalization. Routledge, 2005.
- Durovicova, Natasa, “Local Ghosts: Dubbbing Bodies in early Sound Cinema,” in
A. Antonini, ed: Film and Its Multiples (Udine, 2002). - Gambier, Yves and Gottlieb, H, “Multimedia, Multilingua” in (Multi)Media
Translation (Amsterdam: Benjamins, 2001). - Gentzler, Edwin. “Translation, Poststructuralism, and Power,” in Tymoczko and Gentzler, eds., Translation and Power (U Mass Press, 2002), pp. 196-216.
- Jameson, Frederic. “Notes on Globalization as a Philosophical Issue,” in Jameson and Miyoshi, eds. The Cultures of Globalization (Duke, 1998), pp. 54-77.
- Kenan, Lin. “Translation as a Catalyst for Social Change in China,” in Tymoczko and Gentzler, eds., Translation and Power (U Mass Press, 2002), pp. 160-94.
- Kroes, Rob, “Citizenship and Cyberspace,” from Them And Us: Questions of Citizenship
in a Globalizing World (Chicago: U of Illinois P, 2000). - Mignolo, Walter D. “Globalization, Civilization Processes, and the Relocation of Languages and Cultures,” in Jameson and Mihoshi, eds., The Cultures of Globalization (Duke U P, 1998), pp. 32-53.
- Nida, Eugene. “Principles of Correspondance” from Toward a Science of Translating (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1964), pp. 156-192.
- Nornes, Marcus “For an Abusive Subtitling” in Venuti, ed. The Translation Studies Reader (New York: Routeledge, 2004), pp. 743-84.
- Roundtable on Translation in Christie McDonald, ed. The Ear of the Other:
Otobiography, Transference, Translation (Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 1982) - Paolinelli, Mario, “Dubbing at the gates of the third millennium,” Aberystwyth:
University of Wales. 2000. Conference paper. - Shohat, Ella and Robert Stam, “Cinema After Babel: Language, Difference, Power,"
Screen 26:3-4 (May-August 1985) - Trivedi, Harish, “Translating Culture vs Cultural translation” in 91st Meridian
<http://www.uiowa.edu/~iwp/91st/may2005/trivedi/trivedi2.html> - Venuti, Lawrence. “Simpatico,” in The Translator’s Invisibility (London and New York: Routledge, 1995), pp. 273-306.
Requirements & Evaluation
Evaluation will be based on the following required materials and weighted as indicated:
- one page response paper on one assigned reading and participation: 30%
- final paper, 15-20 pages: 50%
- in-class presentation based on research for final paper: 20%
- The one-page response paper should be a reflective piece on one of the assigned readings. Students will select two possible works on which to write at the first meeting. They will hand in their preferences to the instructors, who will create a schedule of one-pagers for the term. On the day of the assigned response, students their response text ICON, and we’ll then use the response as a partial basis for the discussion of the assigned readings for the day.
- Selection of the topic for the final paper is the responsibility of the student. Topics should conform generally to the themes of the class and should be cleared beforehand with the instructors. Preferred topics will apply an aspect or aspects of the theoretical issues engaged in class in a specific part of the world, or in a well-defined disciplinary domain. The paper is due in Professor Valentino’s mailbox (E210 AJB) by noon on Tuesday, May 8, 2007.
- The in-class presentation should convey in a compelling fashion the most salient aspects of the research that forms the basis of the paper. Feel free to use multimedia or not, as you see fit.
We would like to hear from anyone who has a disability which may require some modification of seating, testing, or other class requirements so that appropriate arrangements may be made. Please contact us during our office hours.
This course is given by the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Class policies on matters such as requirements, grading, and sanctions for academic dishonesty are governed by the CLAS. Students wishing to add or drop this course after the official deadline must receive the approval of the Dean of the CLAS. Details of the University policy of cross enrollments may be found at: http://www.uiowa.edu/~provost/deos/crossenroll.doc.
Schedule
| Week | Date | Topic | Assignments |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unit One | |||
| I | Jan 16 | Terms and Concepts | Cronin “Birds” |
| II | Jan 23 | Translation and Globalization | Cronin, G and T, 1-75 |
| III | Jan 30 | Translation and Globalization | Cronin, G and T, 76- |
| IV | Feb 06 | Translation Studies: the politics of Domestication and Foreignization translation strategies | excerpts from Nida, Berman, Venuti |
| V | Feb 13 | Globalization and Différance I Equivalency, center/periphery | Jameson, Derrida, Roundtable on translation |
| VI | Feb 20 | Globalization and Différance II | Mignolo |
| Unit Two | |||
| VII | Feb 27 | Cultural translation | Bassnett and Lefevere, |
| VIII | Mar 06 | Cultural Translation and Post-Colonial Studies | Kenan, Gentzler |
| Spring Break | |||
Unit Three |
|||
| IX | Mar 20 | Cinema and Translation: Voice |
Altman, Durovicova, Paolinelli |
| M 3/19 7pm AJB 105 | Screening: Der Blaue Engel/The Blue Angel and clips | ||
| X | Mar 27 | Cinema and Translation: Subtitling |
Behar, Cazdyn, Nornes |
| Sun 3/18 7pm AJB 105 | Screening: Russian Arc and clips | ||
| XI | Apr 03 | Cinema and Translation: Polylinguality | Shohat and Stam, Betz |
| Sun 3/25 7pm AJB 105 | Screening: Le mépris and clips | ||
| XII | Apr 10 | Translation and New Media: Localization |
Gambier and Gottlieb, Kroes, Cattrysse |
| XIII | Apr 17 | Translation and New Media: the politics of transliteration, Romanization |
Assemblage of URLs on ICON |
| XIV | Apr 24 | presentations | |
| XV | May 01 | presentations | |